"HE HAS COME BACK." WITHOUT, the wintry sky is overcast : Because of half-way things that hold The floods descend-fierce hail and rush- Prudence that is but trust in gold, And faith that is but fear of death Thou stay'st thy hand from finishing things, Because in careless confidence, So oft we leave the narrow way, Its borders thorny hedges fence, Beyond them marshy deeps affray ; Lo! farther on, the heavenly road Lies through the gardens of our God. Because thy sheep so often still Forsakes the meadow, cool and damp, To climb the stony, grassless hill, Or wallow in the slimy swamp, Thy sicknesses, where'er he roam, Go after him and bring him home. One day, all fear, all ugliness, All pain, all discord, low or loud, All selfishness, and all distress, Shall melt like low-spread morning cloud, And heart and brain be free from thrall, Because thou, God, art all in all. Sunday Magazine. THIS WORLD. BY GEORGE MACDONALD. THY world is made to fit thine own, Because from selfishness and wrath, Our cold and hot extremes of ill, We grope and stagger on the path, Thou tell'st us from thy holy hill, With icy storms and sunshine rude, That we are all unripe in good. Because of snaky things that creep Through our soul's sea, dim-undulant, Thou fill'st the mystery of thy deep With faces heartless, grim and gaunt; That we may know how ugly seem The things our spirit-oceans teem. IN THE FIR-WOODS. GREY pines, companions of my solitude, Which with the change of seasons cannot change, Contracted to life's narrowing winter range, Cloistered within the aisles of this sad wood! Teach me your wisdom, patriarchs! Ye have stood Patient three hundred years, nor thought it strange, Yourselves unstirred, to watch in farm and grange Man's transitory race ten times renewed. Ye murmur not: what though spring's wizard hands Waft you no love-gifts; though nor orient sun Nor sunset have ye gazed on; though the breeze Thrills you with flattering music from far lands You scarce dare dream of; though rills past you run Babbling wayfarers, bound for venturous seas. J. A. SYMONDS. From The Nineteenth Century. CÆSARISM. MOST people will by this time have read Mr. Drummond's book, "Natural Law in the Spiritual World." Some consider that its publication begins a fresh era in the history of theological study, and that its author has really discovered an entirely new way of approaching the subject. Even those who doubt whether he has succeeded in showing, as he professes to do, that the study of the Christian religion is only a higher branch of natural science, have been fascinated by his work. It certainly presents spiritual truths in a new light, and brings them home in a manner which we have long ceased to expect from either commentary or ser mon. I am not, however, about to review this book. I only wish to call attention to a particular chapter, and to consider it as an illustration not of religious, but political life. I mean the chapter on "Parasitism." We find there a description of a creature which once had eyes and ears like other animals, legs that could walk and swim, and jaws with which it could eat, but which, by fixing itself into the body of a shell-crab, and acquiring the habit of drawing all its sustenance, ready digested, from the creature to which it has attached itself, gradually loses all its limbs, all its organs of every description, and becomes a mere bulb. Mr. Drummond makes use of this image to depict the character of the indolent, unreasoning adherent of a popular preacher; but, my head being full of politics when I read it, I could not help applying the description to a large number of those who take part in public life, who attend monster meetings, and who, without ever having thought seriously for themselves, nevertheless, by their mere number and the loudness of their voices, exercise a strong influence upon the decision of important questions. But I postpone for the moment any allusion to the present day. The little animal described by Mr. Drummond is an admirable type of the inhabitants of a civilized nation which formerly enjoyed liberty, but in which despotism has been established. A Roman citizen at the time of the empire is the first example that occurs to me, and we may find many others -a Greek, for instance, or an Italian in those cities which, having been republics, had fallen into the hands of a tyrant. The French during the Second Empire showed marked signs of getting into the same condition. But the French never do anything like anybody else, and they have, I hope, succeeded in breaking their bonds. Such bonds have very seldom been broken before. In general, tyranny does not come till the citizens have thoroughly degenerated, and when it has once come it does not pass away, for the simple reason that the citizens are unable to exist without it. Perhaps the true reason of the extraordinary recovery of the French is that their tyranny was an accidental one, and that the degeneration necessary for it to flourish had not really taken place, though, as I have said, it was beginning as a result of the tyranny. The connection between Cæsarism and the degeneration of the people is one of action and reaction. Either may come first, but in most cases it is, I think, the latter. History, I think, teaches us this, and it also teaches us that for some reason or other this degeneration very often takes place after the establishment of a democracy. It is, moreover, to be noted, that when it follows the establishment of a democracy, it follows it almost immediately. The difficulty, therefore, for democracy is to obtain a fair start. If it is not strangled at its birth, it may be expected to go on living, and the longer it lasts the better hope is there of its resisting its natural enemies, degeneration and the Cæsarism which is its accompani ment. There has been much discussion as to whether there is, or is not, such a thing as a science of history. This science, if it exists, is, I admit, very imperfect. There is no doubt, however, that in certain respects history has a strong tendency to repeat itself; and it is possible sometimes to form a pretty accurate forecast of the future by observing what on other occasions has been the result of circumstances similar to the present. seem to enter the dominion of an entirely new law. Perhaps it is that we have not yet arrived at the point from which our theory started. Perhaps we are going back to the original process of the formation out of chaos of the monarchy with which I have assumed the series of dif ferent forms of government to begin. There is no time so deeply interesting as the Middle Ages. We greedily read everything that even for a moment really illuminates their tantalizing twilight. But we feel that we are in an altogether different world from the one around us. Indeed our very interest in the Middle Ages comes in a great measure from their complete want of connection with the present. We feel far more at home when we read of Rome and Greece in the days of their highest civilization, and we have far more affinity with that period. I do not then think it wrong to assume that the historic laws which prevailed in those days are more likely to prevail now than those which governed the actions of our barbarous ancestors, all the more as I see the civilized States of Italy even during the Middle Ages subject to the same historic laws as ancient Greece and Rome. I will then put aside the Middle Ages in the inquiry which I am about to prosecute. There is a generally recognized landmark where the Middle Ages are by common consent supposed to end, and modern his It is, indeed, from its assistance to us in this respect that the study of history derives its chief use and its chief interest. One of the lessons which this study teaches us with the greatest distinctness is, that different forms of government have a tendency to follow one another in a particular order. The rule is, of course, subject to many exceptions. A State may be conquered by some other power in the middle of its career, and cease to have a separate being, or some abnormal action may take place within its own limits. As a rule, however, a monarchy is succeeded by an oligarchy; an oligarchy, after a more or less prolonged struggle, by a democracy; and a democracy by the dominion of an autocrat. I may remark, in passing, that the chief difference between the king who begins the series, and the despot who ends it, is that the king leans more or less upon the nobles who are destined in the course of nature to supplant him, and the despot upon the people whose power he has appropriated. I have said that there are exceptions to the rule. But they are often only so in appearance. A king is sometimes overthrown by a democracy; but it is in general only for a short time, and either he or his heir is pretty sure to be restored to the throne. An oligarchy is sometimes apparently subjugated by an autocrat, but it is by the autocrat placing himself at the head of the people under the pretence of liberat-tory to begin. I refer to the time of the ing them, and in most cases the rudiments discovery of America, the Reformation, of an intervening democracy, however im and the revival of classical learning. I perfect and transitory, may be discovered will take this as my starting-point. by a careful eye. Any person who wishes to verify what I have stated will find a boundless field for observation among the Greek cities of antiquity, and, excepting as regards a monarchy, the Italian cities of the Middle Ages. But the most perfect example of the whole sequence is presented to us by the greatest State that ever existed. It may be seen in the history of Rome from the time of Tarquin to that of Augustus. What militates against the theory that I have laid down is that there is nothing to confirm it in the development of the larger States of Europe during the Middle Ages. In tracing this development we I began this article with reference to our own country, and I now return to it. Let us consider at what period in the history of a nation we have arrived, and whether our history up to the present moment adapts itself to my theory. Starting from the beginning of the sixteenth century, we may say, speaking roughly, that we have run the usual course: first through monarchy not only nominal, but real; then through aristo. cratic government, tempered indeed, both from above and from below, but sufficiently marked not to remove us from the common type, and latterly further and further into democracy, till, if it is not Let us now consider how the aristocratic period came to an end. It was briefly thus. Attention was for a long time diverted from home matters by a desperate and all-absorbing war. Soon after the peace the great families which I have mentioned, who now formed the nucleus of the Whig party, had the happy instinct to ally themselves with the people. The people were beginning to demand the free exercise of the rights which they had always in theory possessed. The impor. tance of the alliance between the Whigs and the people in facilitating the transfer of power, in mitigating class bitterness, and in preserving constitutional continu yet altogether our form of government, it may say that during the whole period bepromises to be so in a short time. Such tween the Revolution of 1688 and the first has been our course till now, and every Reform Bill, the government was, on the change that has taken place hitherto ap- whole, in the hands of the upper classes. pears to me to have been inevitable. It was they who had to be conciliated by will not enter into an argument as to what William the Third, and who occasionally is the best form of government. In my thwarted him. It was they who ruled opinion a democracy, if it can only last, under Anne. It was they who were bribed and if law and order can be maintained by Walpole; and in the middle of the under it, has at least as much to recom- century they were led by a few great fammend it as anything else. But whether ilies whose quarrels and coalitions constiwe like it or not is a matter of small im-tute the political history of that epoch. portance. It has come upon us in the Even the monarchical reaction at the end course of nature, and nothing could have of the century may perhaps be considprevented it. Looking back through the ered as an insurrection, under the auspices last three centuries, we see no point where of the king, of the mass of the upper the stream could have been dammed, or classes against these few great families. where any attempt to dam it was otherwise than productive of evil. On the other hand, any effort on the part of our rulers to hasten the course of events produced a temporary reaction. If the power of the monarch was prematurely put an end to in the time of Charles the First, the result was after a few years to increase for a moment the authority of Charles the Second. But when public opinion had definitely decreed that the centre of power must be shifted, nothing could have prevented the change. If the revolution against James the Second had been deferred, it would only have been more complete, and the supreme rule, having once slipped away from the crown, never wasity, cannot be over-estimated. But even and never could have been restored to it. Next followed what I have called the period of aristocratic government. But it is only we who look back to it who call it by that name, and only when we speak rather loosely. Because authority was centred in the House of Commons, men imagined at the time that they lived in a free country, and the oligarchy, whom we now look upon as having pulled the strings, took care to disguise their power by speaking in the name of liberty. There was still a great deal of latent strength in the crown, as George the Third discovered when he began to draw upon it. In times of excitement the people could already make their voices pretty distinctly heard. But after making these admissions in favor of the king on the one hand, and of the people on the other, we if there had been no Whigs, the transfer would have taken place. It would have come a little later, but it would have been attended with greater violence, and we should by this time have been at least as far advanced into democracy as we are. The Reform Bill of 1832 may be considered, roughly speaking, as the end of our aristocratic period. Is it to be wished that this period had lasted longer? There is something fascinating at first sight in the government of an enlightened oligarchy like the Spartans of old, the Romans at the time of the second Punic war, or the Venetians of the Middle Ages. The grand tranquillity of their movements, and the lofty atmosphere of patri. otism and statesmanship which surrounds them, captivate our fancy. We admire the spectacle of a certain number of ruling families animated with a high sense of honor, accustomed to the give and take of politics, taught by tradition never to push party feeling to the serious detriment of the country, trained from their earliest years to the conduct of business, and always ready to produce a certain number of men of more than ordinary cultivation. The ministers of state chosen by natural selection from among these families, if there is sufficient competition to keep them in order and to stir them to exertion, are sometimes administrators of a very high degree of merit. But there is one fatal weakness in an oligarchical government. Even supposing that the high sense of honor is maintained, that indolence and luxury do not creep in among the governing class, that the field is wide enough to secure the forthcoming of a sufficient number of able men - supposing all this, which is to suppose a great deal, nothing compensates for the fatal want of public spirit which this system almost as much as a despotism engenders among the masses. Indeed, the tyranny of an individual is, for some reasons, less hateful than the absolute supremacy of a class. I would consider, then, that in a perfect State an oligarchical government has great merits and great disadvantages. Our oligarchy was far from perfect. There was, in the first place, a constant and easy flow backwards and forwards between the ruling caste and the masses below, and the boundaries were very vaguely defined. In the next place we must remember, what I have before stated, that the power of the aristocracy was indirect and veiled from the public eye. Both the merits and the disadvantages of our oligarchy, if we may call it by that name, were less than in Venice or in Sparta. On the one hand the dominant class were less thoroughly trained, less highly braced for exertion, in less perfect condition for all the duties of public life. On the other hand they were less unpopular with those below them, and there was more public spirit among the main body of the people. It must be confessed that the history of England during our aristocratic government was a glorious one. The chief blot upon it, the disgraceful and disastrous manner in which we parted from our American colonies, may be imputed to the king during the temporary revival of monarchical power. It may be observed, too, that the patriotism, the integrity, the political intelligence, and the public virtue of the class which then governed the country, increased with every year of their ascen dency. Those who regret these days have much to say for themselves. On the whole I differ from them, but I will content myself with repeating that the change which took place could not have been avoided. According to the form of the Constitution, from the moment that the chief power had been vested in the House of Commons it was vested in the people. The authority of the aristocracy depended upon a restricted and irregular franchise and a grossly and ludicrously unfair distribution of seats. This could not long be maintained when once it was seriously threatened. The middle class, growing daily in wealth and numbers, in energy and intelligence, must, under any circumstances, have before long obtained supremacy. They did so in 1832, and in their turn they have had since to submit to the inevitable, and first to divide, soon probably to transfer, their power. It is not my business to enter into the transition period of the last fifty years. It will no doubt in the future be considered a very interesting part of our constitutional history, and will probably fall naturally into a chapter by itself between the aristocratic and the democratic periods. We have certainly made progress. Whether up or down, I will leave to be argued by the historians of our two rival schools, the followers of Macaulay and the followers of Carlyle. I have always considered myself one of the former, but on one thing only have I ventured to give a decided opinion, which I once more reiterate: no change that has taken place in our Constitution could, I say, have been prevented. But this, it may be said, is after all only an opinion, and many of my readers may disagree with me. Everybody, however, must admit that we cannot now retrace our steps. In politics what is done cannot be undone. Let us look before us instead of behind, but do not let us look forward too far. Let us, in the brave and wise spirit of our best and ablest statesmen of all generations, try to discover and to meet the dangers that are immediately in front of us, leaving the far future to take care of itself, and having confidence in the destiny of our race. I do not know that I am not rather breaking this good rule and looking forward too far when I allude to some form of Cæsarism as one of the dangers that may possibly threaten us. But we must remember that this is the step which would come next in our history if it continued to follow the ordinary course. am not alone in my apprehensions. They I |